http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/sns-rt-us-congo-democratic-rwanda-unbre8ak132-20121121,0,2464921.story
Led by Rwanda, Congo army mutiny became well-armed revolt: U.N. experts
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Michelle Nichols
Reuters
11:51 a.m. CST, November 21, 2012
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The rebel seizure of a key city in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo comes eight months after a small mutiny grew into a well-armed insurgency commanded by Rwanda's defense minister, U.N. experts and some officials say.
The Congolese government says Rwanda is orchestrating the revolt to grab resources including diamonds, gold and coltan, used in electronics. Kigali denies the charges.
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Free List of Medicare Advantage & Medicare Part D Plans. Compare Now!PlanPrescriber.com/MedicareHundreds of soldiers defected from the Congolese army in March in North Kivu province and joined the M23 rebel group, whose ranks have swelled to several thousand with the help of fighters recruited by the Rwandan army, U.N. experts said.
A confidential report by the U.N. Security Council's Group of Experts, first seen by Reuters last month and made public on Wednesday, said Rwandan troops have also been reinforcing M23 operations and supplying weapons and ammunition, while Rwandan Defense Minister James Kabarebe has been commanding the entire rebellion from Kigali.
Speaking to the U.N. Security Council via video link from Kinshasa on Wednesday, Roger Meece, head of the 17,000-strong U.N. mission in Congo known as MONUSCO, said M23 has achieved what he described as "impressive capabilities."
He said peacekeepers had encountered English-speaking rebels - an official language of Rwanda, not Congo - with surprising weaponry and equipment, suggesting they had external support.
"The M23 forces are well-provisioned and well-supplied with uniforms and a variety of arms and ammunitions, many of which clearly have not come from existing FARDC (Congolese army) stocks," Meece told the Security Council.
"They exhibit many characteristics of a strong, disciplined, established military force with sophisticated tactics and operations, including night operations, which are not characteristic of traditional performance," he said.
The M23 rebels vowed on Wednesday to "liberate" all of the Democratic Republic of Congo after seizing the city of Goma on Tuesday.
The U.N. experts report said Rwanda exercised overall command and strategic planning for M23. The report also accused Uganda of aiding the insurgency, a claim Kampala denies.
"Rwanda continues to violate the arms embargo through direct military support to M23 rebels, facilitation of recruitment, encouragement and facilitation of FARDC (Congolese army) desertions as well as the provision of arms and ammunition, intelligence, and political advice," said the UN report.
The experts said in the report that M23 officers and soldiers had witnessed deliveries of weapons and ammunition by the Rwandan army to M23 headquarters every two weeks since the rebellion started.
EASTERN CONGO 'ANNEXED'
A U.N. official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said on Tuesday that as the rebels advanced on Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, they appeared to have received help as they had grown in numbers and "suddenly got a lot better."
"On Thursday when they launched their first attack, they were not able to repulse the Congolese army," the official said. "On Friday there was a bit of a lull and on Saturday morning it was just like a Blitzkrieg. ... Their tactics are good."
Another senior U.N. official has said Rwanda had effectively "annexed" eastern Congo using the rebel force, and the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday condemned in a resolution "attempts by the M23 to establish an illegitimate parallel administration and to undermine state authority.
Rwanda's Foreign Minister Louise Mushikiwabo said last month that Kigali has no "desire to cut off part of the DRC. ... Rwanda is very happy with its size." Rwanda has backed armed movements in the Congo over the past two decades, citing a need to tackle Rwandan rebels operating out of Congo's eastern hills.
The Security Council also expressed deep concern in its resolution "that external support continues to be provided to the M23, including through troop reinforcement, tactical advice and the supply of equipment, causing a significant increase of the military abilities of the M23."
The council's resolution "demands that any and all outside support to the M23 cease immediately."
The rebellion is partly funded by traders in Rwanda who are profiting from tin, tungsten and tantalum smuggled across the border from mines in the eastern DRC, according to the U.N. experts' report.
The experts said M23 had been seeking to open a front in western Congo and as a result had "adopted a broader political platform, denouncing the flaws in the 2011 electoral process and the lack of good governance by the President Joseph Kabila."
Goma's capture will be an embarrassment for Kabila, who won re-election late last year in polls that triggered widespread riots in Kinshasa and which international observers said were marred by fraud.
The M23 rebels take their name from a March 2009 peace deal that ended a previous rebellion in North Kivu and led to their integration into the national army. They accuse the government of not respecting the deal.
The renewed fighting was also partly triggered by Kabila's announcement that he would arrest former Congolese general Bosco Ntaganda - who controls the rebellion on the ground in eastern Congo - on International Criminal Court charges of conscripting child soldiers, murder, ethnic persecution and rape.
The full U.N. Security Council's Group of Experts report on Congo can be seen here: http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=S/2012/843
(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Editing by Tiffany Wu and Todd Eastham)
The dictator Kagame at UN
Dictators like Kagame who have changed their national constitutions to remain indefinitely on power should not be involved in UN high level and global activities including chairing UN meetings
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Thousands of Hutu murdered by Kagame inside Rwanda, e.g. Kibeho massacres
Kagame killed 200,000 Hutus from all regions of the country, the elderly and children who were left by their relatives, the disabled were burned alive. Other thousands of people were killed in several camps of displaced persons including Kibeho camp. All these war crimes remain unpunished.The British news reporters were accompanying Kagame’s fighters on day-by-day basis and witnessed these massacres, but they never reported on this.
25,000 Hutu bodies floated down River Akagera into Lake Victoria in Uganda.
The British irrational, extremist, partisan,biased, one-sided media and politicians have disregarded Kagame war crimes e.g. the Kibeho camp massacres, massacres of innocents Hutu refugees in DR. Congo. The British media have been supporting Kagame since he invaded Rwanda by organising the propaganda against the French over the Rwandan genocide, suppressing the truth about the genocide and promoting the impunity of Kagame and his cronies in the African Great Lakes Region. For the British, Rwanda does not need democracy, Rwanda is the African Israel; and Kagame and his guerilla fighters are heroes.The extremist British news reporters including Fergal Keane, Chris Simpson, Chris McGreal, Mark Doyle, etc. continue to hate the Hutus communities and to polarise the Rwandan society.
Kagame political ambitions triggered the genocide.
Kagame’s guerrilla war was aimed at accessing to power at any cost. He rejected all attempts and advice that could stop his military adventures including the cease-fire, political negotiations and cohabitation, and UN peacekeeping interventions. He ignored all warnings that could have helped him to manage the war without tragic consequences. Either you supported Kagame’ s wars and you are now his friend, or you were against his wars and you are his enemy. Therefore, Kagame as the Rwandan strong man now, you have to apologise to him for having been against his war and condemned his war crimes, or accept to be labelled as having been involved in the genocide. All key Kagame’s fighters who committed war crimes and crimes against humanity are the ones who hold key positions in Rwandan army and government for the last 15 years. They continue to be supported and advised by the British including Tony Blair, Andrew Mitchell MP, and the British army senior officials.
Aid that kills: The British Budget Support financed Museveni and Kagame’s wars in Rwanda and DRC.
Genocide propaganda and fabrications are used by the so-called British scholars, news reporters and investigative journalists to promote their CVs and to get income out of the genocide through the selling of their books, providing testimonies against the French, access to consultancy contracts from the UN and Kagame, and participation in conferences and lectures in Rwanda, UK and internationally about genocide. Genocide propaganda has become a lucrative business for Kagame and the British. Anyone who condemned or did not support Kagame’s war is now in jail in Rwanda under the gacaca courts system suuported by British tax payer's money, or his/she is on arrest warrant if he/she managed to flee the Kagame’s regime. Others have fled the country and are still fleeing now. Many others Rwandans are being persecuted in their own country. Kagame is waiting indefinitely for the apologies from other players who warn him or who wanted to help to ensure that political negotiations take place between Kagame and the former government he was fighting against. Britain continues to supply foreign aid to Kagame and his cronies with media reports highlighting economic successes of Rwanda. Such reports are flawed and are aimed at misleading the British public to justify the use of British taxpayers’ money. Kagame and his cronies continue to milk British taxpayers’ money under the British budget support. This started from 1986 through the British budget support to Uganda until now.
Dictator Kagame: No remorse for his unwise actions and ambitions that led to the Rwandan genocide.
No apologies yet to the Rwandan people. The assassination of President Juvenal Habyarimana by Kagame was the only gateway for Kagame to access power in Rwanda. The British media, politicians, and the so-called British scholars took the role of obstructing the search for the truth and justice; and of denying this assassination on behalf of General Kagame. General Paul Kagame has been obliging the whole world to apologise for his mistakes and war crimes. The UK’s way to apologise has been pumping massive aid into Rwanda's crony government and parliement; and supporting Kagame though media campaigns.
Fanatical, partisan, suspicious, childish and fawning relations between UK and Kagame
Kagame receives the British massive aid through the budget support, British excessive consultancy, sector wide programmes, the Tutsi-dominated parliament, British and Tutsi-owned NGOs; for political, economic and English language expansion to Rwanda. The British aid to Rwanda is not for all Rwandans. It is for Kagame himself and his Tutsi cronies.
Paul Kagame' actvities as former rebel
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